The most beautiful Rose in the World

I have fallen in love with a rose so much so that I am calling it the most beautiful rose in the world. I will not say what it is for the moment, for I first want to make clear what I am talking about. A year or two ago I produced a list of my desert island roses, but in choosing them I had in mind a number of criteria, which might be summarised under the general title of all-round garden performers. This immediately makes me think of the Hybrid Musks, for if you were confined to only one family group they would surely be the ones to go for. They are extremely healthy, they repeat, they comes in various colours. They mostly have smell. Many of you will have some in your garden. All of you should have one or two.  I guess that the most famous would include Buff Beauty, Cornelia, Felicia, and Penelope. Comparatively new for me are Belinda, a semi-double strongish pink, Kathleen a blush pink and Vanity which I would call red rather than pink, all of which thrive here. There are in fact real reds,or perhaps I mean crimson, such as Nur Mahal and Wilhelm, not in fact my favourites. One that is, and I think that I have never been without it, is Moonlight, which as the name suggests is a luminous white. What is amazing about these roses is that many of them date from the 1920s raised by an Anglican clergyman, the Rev. Joseph Pemberton, but still as good as ever in the early twenty first century.

When I composed my Desert Island two roses were at the very top of my list, Fantin Latour and the Queen of Danemark, which often appears in a catalogue as Konigen von Danemark. Fantin Latour was the first Old-Fashioned rose that I fell in love with, first seen at Sissinghurst some fifty years ago, and never forgotten. It is full petalled, blush pink and fragrant on a large and normally healthy bush. An interesting comparison would be with one of David Austin's earlier and extremely successful English Roses, Mary Rose named after Henry VIII's flagship. It is a very good garden rose of a similar pink to Fantin Latour, but unlike Fantin Latour it repeats which has to be an advantage,especially in a small garden. But if you compare the individual flower I would  always plump for the old rose. The secret of the Queen of Denmark, which also does not repeat, resides in a particular moment when the bud is halfway open. The centre is of a much deeper pink which suffuses the rest of the rose. In my view this is quite unique, and for instance I do not think that anything David Austin has produced quite matches it.

Still I am not one to do down David Austin roses. May be he has produced too many, often rather similar roses, and what I call a French criticism of them is that the actual bush is often unattractive. But that is certainly not true of all them. At the moment in this garden we have Crown Princess Margareta, Pat Austin and Jude the Obscure in full flower on very large and attractive bushes, and mention particularly of the latter reminds me to stress that many of the David Austin Roses have very strong scent.

Also in flower, but on a bush that cannot be said to be very strong growing, and rather prone to disease is William Shakespeare 2000. But the individual flower is very beautiful, a deep velvety crimson coming on purple, and it is in this colour range that I find some of the most beautiful roses for reasons that I cannot fully explain.  A lot of the Old-Fashioned roses are in this colour range - Cardinal de  Richelieu, Charles de Mills, Duc de Guiche, Tuscanny Superb and William Lobb to mention but a few, not to mention such wonderful climbers such as Ena Harkness, Etoile Hollande and Guinée.  And then there is Souvenir de Dr Jamain which can be grown either as a largish bush or climber. It has beautiful dark crimson flowers but, and this is a general warning about many of the roses in this colour range, is very prone to browning in full sun.

Many of the most beautiful individual flowers will be found amongst the Hybrid Teas, which ruled the roost back in the Fifties. Does anybody now remember Super Star, or even Peace, which the Quest Ritsons in the RHS Encyclopedia of Roses, where it is placed under its original name of Mme A.Meilland, call "simply the most famous rose in the world" ? Hybrid teas have the great advantage that they usually come with single flowers on long stems, very useful for the flower arrangers. They often have good scent, almost always repeat and their colour range is extensive.  I do not particularly like them, no doubt because my generation reacted rather violently against them, just as we did against all things Victorian. But fashions change and I guess that they are probably due for a revival. Still it is not amongst them that my new love is to be found.

My new love is called Bardou Job, admittedly not the most romantic of names - and I should, but do not know, what Bardou signifies, and I pronounce Job as I do the Old Testament character who had some trouble with a whale. But it is a rose with a history. Apparently it was bred in Wales, which in itself is slightly unusual, and then migrated to Australia; originally I thought that I was told to Alcatraz, so there does seem to be some connection with convicts. Anyway to my great pleasure it now resides in the Gers. Its flower are single going on semi, which amongst other things enables one to see the attractive stamens. One can also see very clearly the petals, and it is this fact that more and more attracts me to any single flowered rose. Take for instance the wild dog rose, Rosa canina, which I suppose because of the rain have never been so floriferous chez nous. The nuance of pinks on a single pink are a wonder. Or take the well known climber, Mermaid, with its nuances of yellow, when it first comes out. Similarly with Bardou Job, though in its case it is a mixtures of deep reds going on almost black. It is too early to say whether it is going to be an easy rose to grow. Ours in its second year has clumped up well and has produced quite a lot of flowers, but it is still under a meter and the foliage is not its most attractive feature. But I would be happy if it had only one flower a year, so much am I in love with it.  It is to be found at La Roseraie du Desert, for which see www.frenchtearose.com.